Alignment of Business in China

Introduction

After reading The Essential Drucker, I continue to be astonished by the fact the concepts/principles explained are over twenty years old. Perhaps it is the juncture that I am at in my career that I gave careful consideration to the topics I chose to write about. In particular the two concepts/principles that resonated most with me were 1.) The Individual – The Second Half of Your Life and 2.) The Individual – Know Your Strength and Values. As it is my nature, within the examination of each topic I also take the opportunity to play devil's advocate.

The Individual – Second Half of Your Life

Drucker points out that there is a shift in the career lifecycle and the knowledge worker will outlive their respective organization and should plan accordingly in ‘The Individual – Second Half of Your Life' section. In effect, this requires an individual to be the CEO of their career growth and development for their second career; when exhausted, bored, or removed from their primary career. Simply put, Drucker's recommends three points for the "Second Half of Life": 1.) get started, 2.) execute in parallel with current career, and 3.) give back.

This is fairly profound for being written more than twenty years ago. However, the contrarian in me wonders about the demographic lifecycle when this was written versus modern times. Highlighting the fact that people will live longer added little merit to Drucker's position and I deem this statement more as self-evident and expounding upon easily ascertained historical information. However, increases in generational longevity may help account for a growing population waiting until much later in life to marry or have children – settle down. This means the traditional time periods that are typically most expensive, such as college attendance by their children, will be deferred. Due to the fact a larger demographic is waiting to marry and have children, I will admit to being able to see a persons' employment career span evolving into thirds (rather than halves) based on personal growth, raising a family, and pursuing a passion. I believe this trend will continue or expand as future generations enter the workforce.

On a personal note, reading the section "The Individual – Second Half of Your Life" startled me. Intuitively I think I have known for some time that I am delinquent in planning my "second half". After I reread this section, it became more apparent that either due to laziness or not being able to fully articulate my intuition, long term actions have not been put in place and I have indeed been fortunate to have companies manage my career because I have not. I have worked in Aerospace for almost eighteen years, gaining positions of increasing scope and responsibility. In fact, when I think about it, somewhere along the way